The Weeknd Appeared to Get Pretty Emotional Over Selena Gomez at Coachella This Weekend

The first night of Coachella culminated in a 23-song set from the Weeknd, the musician who, these days, is probably best known for his very candid, very emo lyrics that are not-even-veiled allusions to his recent relationships with Bella Hadid and Selena Gomez. It was the first time the Weeknd performed the new music from his six-song EP My Dear Melancholy, which was released just over two weeks ago, including the EP’s opening track, “Call Out My Name.”

With lyrics like “I almost cut a piece of myself for your life” and “We found each other / I helped you out of a broken place,” “Call Out My Name” seems pretty overtly directed at Gomez. Their relationship came to an official end last November, when they unfollowed each other on Instagram. Shortly after, Gomez started going to church/brunch/bike riding with her then ex-boyfriend, now maybe-ex-boyfriend Justin Bieber, and Abel Tesfaye was spotted leaving Hadid’s apartment, though not much more seems to have come of that.

But despite time passing and all parties moving on, Tesfaye's Coachella performance seemed to indicate that he’s still not over Gomez. It was, after all, at last year’s Coachella that he and Gomez made their relationship Instagram official, so it’s an especially meaningful anniversary. As he made his way through “Call Out My Name,” some fans noted, he appeared to even squeeze out a tear or two and, at one point, became so overcome with emotion that he stifled a few particularly resonant lyrics. (Other observers disagreed: “Twitter thinks he’s crying. Maybe it’s a drop of sweat from one man’s marathon performance,” Eve Barlow wrote in a tepid review of the show for The Guardian.)

While Gomez herself doesn’t seem to be in Indio for this year’s festival (given that, during a weekend that is apparently all about special guest appearances, Rita Ora subbed in for her during Kygo’s performance of “It Ain’t Me”), Bieber and Hadid both are—and Hadid was even rumored to be in the crowd during Tesfaye’s headlining set. Not to worry: Before he got to “Call Out My Name,” Tesfaye also played the apparently Hadid-inspired “Wasted Times,” in which he croons, “I hope you know this dick is still an option…You were equestrian, so ride it like a champion.”